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Eleventh U.S. National Conference on Earthquake Engineering : integrating science, engineering and policy (June 25-29, 2018 Los Angeles, California)
Liquefaction hazard due to induced seismicity : overview of the pilot study being performed for the Groningen Region of the Netherlands
The Groningen gas field is one of the largest in the world and has produced over 2000 billion m3 of natural gas since the start of production in 1963. The first earthquakes linked to the gas production in the Groningen field occurred in 1991, with the largest event to date being an ML3.6. In response to concerns about the induced earthquakes, the field operator is leading an effort to quantify the seismic hazard and risk resulting from the gas production operations, to include the assessment of the liquefaction hazard. However, due to the unique characteristics of both the seismic hazard and the geologic profiles/soil deposits in Groningen, direct application of existing liquefaction evaluation procedures was deemed inappropriate. Accordingly, efforts were first focused on developing Groningen-specific relationships for evaluating liquefaction potential of the region. The liquefaction hazard is being calculated using a Monte Carlo method, wherein for each event scenario, the Groningen-specific relationships are being used to compute the factor of safety (FS) against liquefaction as a function of depth and corresponding Ishihara Inspired Liquefaction Potential Index (LPIish) hazard curves are being computed. This overall approach is particularly well suited to the specific nature of the time-dependent induced seismicity being considered and is forming the basis on which decisions will be made regarding the need for implementing mitigation measures.
An optical classification tool for global lake waters
Shallow and deep lakes receive and recycle organic and inorganic substances from within the confines of these lakes, their watershed and beyond. Hence, a large range in absorption and scattering and extreme differences in optical variability can be found between and within global lakes. This poses a challenge for atmospheric correction and bio-optical algorithms applied to optical remote sensing for water quality monitoring applications. To optimize these applications for the wide variety of lake optical conditions, we adapted a spectral classification scheme based on the concept of optical water types. The optical water types were defined through a cluster analysis of in situ hyperspectral remote sensing reflectance spectra collected by partners and advisors of the European Union 7th Framework Programme (FP7) Global Lakes Sentinel Services (GLaSS) project. The method has been integrated in the Envisat-BEAM software and the Sentinel Application Platform (SNAP) and generates maps of water types from image data. Two variations of water type classification are provided: one based on area-normalized spectral reflectance focusing on spectral shape (6CN, six-class normalized) and one that retains magnitude with no modification to the reflectance signal (6C). This resulted in a protocol, or processing scheme, that can also be applied or adapted for Sentinel-3 Ocean and Land Colour Imager (OLCI) datasets. We apply both treatments to MERIS imagery of a variety of European lakes to demonstrate its applicability. The studied target lakes cover a range of biophysical types, from shallow turbid to deep and clear, as well as eutrophic and dark absorbing waters, rich in colored dissolved organic matter (CDOM). In shallow, high-reflecting Dutch and Estonian lakes with high sediment load, 6C performed better, while in deep, low-reflecting clear Italian and Swedish lakes, 6CN performed better. The 6CN classification of in situ data is promising for very dark, high CDOM, absorbing lakes, but we show that our atmospheric correction of the imagery was insufficient to corroborate this. We anticipate that the application of the protocol to other lakes with unknown in-water characterization, but with comparable biophysical properties will suggest similar atmospheric correction (AC) and in-water retrieval algorithms for global lakes.
Large-scale, probabilistic salinity mapping using airborne electromagnetics for groundwater management in Zeeland, the Netherlands
Seawater intrusion has often resulted in scarce fresh groundwater resources in coastal lowlands. Careful management is essential to avoid the overexploitation of these vulnerable fresh groundwater resources, requiring detailed information on their spatial occurrence. Airborne electromagnetics (EM) has proved a valuable tool for efficient mapping of ground conductivity, as a proxy for fresh groundwater resources. Stakeholders are, however, interested in groundwater salinity, necessitating a translation of ground conductivity to groundwater salinity. This paper presents a methodology to construct a high-resolution (50 x 50 x 0.5 m3) 3D voxel model of groundwater chloride concentration probability, based on a large-scale (1800 km2 , 9640 flight line kilometres) airborne EM survey in the province of Zeeland, the Netherlands. Groundwater chloride concentration was obtained by combining pedotransfer functions with detailed lithological information. The methodology includes a Monte Carlo based forward uncertainty propagation approach to quantify the inherent uncertainty in the different steps. Validation showed good correspondence both with available groundwater chloride analyses, and with ground-based hydrogeophysical measurements. Our results show the limited occurrence of fresh groundwater in Zeeland, as 75% of the area lacks fresh groundwater within 15 m below ground surface. Fresh groundwater is mainly limited to the dune area and sandy creek ridges. In addition, significant fresh groundwater resources were shown to exist below saline groundwater, where infiltration of seawater during marine transgressions was hindered by the presence of clayey aquitards. The considerable uncertainty in our results highlights the importance of applying uncertainty analysis in airborne EM surveys. Uncertainty in our results mainly originated from the inversion and the 3D interpolation, and was largest at transition zones between fresh and saline groundwater. Reporting groundwater salinity instead of ground conductivity facilitated the rapid uptake of our results by relevant stakeholders, thereby supporting the necessary management of fresh groundwater resources in the region.
Significance of fluvial sediment supply in coastline modelling at tidal inlets
The sediment budget associated with future coastline change in the vicinity of tidal inlets consists of four components; sea level rise-driven landward movement of the coastline (i.e., the Bruun effect), basin infilling effect due to sea level rise-induced increase in accommodation space, basin volume change due to variation in river discharge, and coastline change caused by change in fluvial sediment supply. These four components are affected by climate change and/or anthropogenic impacts. Despite this understanding, holistic modelling techniques that account for all the aforementioned processes under both climate change and anthropogenic influences are lacking. This manuscript presents the applications of a newly-developed reduced complexity modelling approach that accounts for both climate change and anthropogenically-driven impacts on future coastline changes. Modelled results corresponding to the year 2100 indicate considerable coastline recessions at Wilson Inlet (152 m) and the Swan River system (168 m) in Australia and Tu Hien Inlet (305 m) and Thuan An Inlet (148 m) in Vietnam. These results demonstrate that coastline models should incorporate both climate change and anthropogenic impacts to quantify future changes in fluvial sediment supply to coasts to achieve better estimates of total coastline changes at tidal inlets. Omission of these impacts is one of the major drawbacks in all the existing coastline models that simulate future coastline changes at tidal inlets. A comparison of these modelled future coastline changes with the predictions made by a relevant existing modelling technique (Scale Aggregated Model for Inlet-interrupted Coasts (SMIC)) indicates that the latter method overestimates total coastline recessions at the Swan River system, and the Tu Hien and Thuan An Inlets by 7%, 10%, and 30%, respectively, underlining the significance of integrating both climate change and anthropogenic impacts to assess future coastline changes at tidal inlets.
Horizontal circulation patterns in a large shallow lake : Taihu Lake, China
Wind induced hydrodynamic circulations play significant roles in the transport and mixing process of pollutants and nutrients in large shallow lakes, but they have been usually overlooked, while environmental, biological, and ecological aspects of eutrophication problems get the most focus. Herein we use a three-dimensional model, driven by steady/unsteady wind, river discharge, rainfall, evaporation to investigate the spatially heterogeneous, large-scale hydrodynamic circulations and their role in transporting and mixing mechanisms in Taihu Lake. Wind direction and velocity determines the overall hydrodynamic circulation structure, i.e. direction, intensity, and position. A relative stable hydrodynamic circulation pattern has been formed shortly with steady wind (~ 2 days). Vertical profiles of horizontal velocities are linearly correlated to the relative shallowness of water depth. Volume exchange between subbasins, influenced by wind speed and initial water level, differs due to the complex topography and irregular shape. With unsteady wind, these findings are still valid to a high degree. Vertical variations in hydrodynamic circulation are important in explaining the surface accumulation of algae scums in Meiliang Bay in summers. Vorticity of velocity field, a key indicator of hydrodynamic circulation, is determined by wind direction, bathymetry gradient, and water depth. The maximum change of velocity vorticity happens when wind direction is perpendicular to bathymetry gradient. Furthermore, Lagrangian-based tracer transport is used to estimate emergency pollution leakage impacts, and also to evaluate operational management measurements, such as, the large-scale water transfer. The conclusion is that the large-scale water transfer does not affect the hydrodynamic circulation and volume exchanges between subbasins significantly, but succeeds to transport and then mix the fresh, clean Yangtze River water to a majority area of Taihu Lake.
Room for Rivers : risk reduction by enhancing the flood conveyance capacity of The Netherlands’ large rivers
The Netherlands has just finished implementing the Room for the Rivers program along the Rhine and Meuse Rivers in response to increasing river discharges. Recently, making more room for the river is, however, being challenged for future application because the flood defenses are assessed to be too weak and will need reinforcement anyway. To be able to decide on the most desirable policy for the remainder of the century, we require knowledge of all benefits and costs of individual interventions and strategic alternatives for flood mitigation. In this paper, we quantify some benefits of making more room for the rivers. We recognize and quantify two risk-reducing effects and provide results of analyses for the Rhine and Meuse Rivers in The Netherlands. Making room for rivers was originally advocated because it (1) reduces the consequences of flooding, as well as (2) reduces the probability of failure of the embankments. We have now quantified these effects allowing translation into risk reduction proper. Moreover, larger floodplain surface area may influence the relationship between discharge and flood level, which implies that rivers with widened floodplains are less sensitive to uncertainties about future river discharges. This does not reduce risk proper, but makes the river system more robust, as we shall argue in the discussion where we present risk reduction and robustness as complementary perspectives for assessing strategic alternatives for flood risk management.
Wave overtopping on dikes : the effect of transitions on the flow and dike cover erosion
One of the main failure mechanisms of dikes is wave overtopping. The overtopping flow causes erosion of the dike cover on the dike crest and the landward side of the dike. Once the dike cover is eroded, erosion of the core material of the dike starts resulting in weakening of the dike and finally in a dike breach. Two PhD’s from the Water and Engineering Management Department of the University of Twente started on the challenge of quantifying the effect of transitions in grass covered dikes on the overtopping flow and the resulting dike cover erosion.
Risk-based target reliability indices for quay walls
Design codes and standards rely on generalised target reliability indices. It is unclear, however, whether these indices are applicable to the specific risk-profile of marine structures. In this study, target reliability indices for quay walls were derived from various risk acceptance criteria, such as economic optimisation, individual risk (IR), societal risk (SR), the life quality index (LQI) and the social and environmental repercussion index (SERI). Important stochastic design variables in quay wall design, such as retaining height, soil strength and material properties, are largely time-independent, whereas other design variables are time-dependent. The extent to which a reliability problem is time variant affects the present value of future failure costs and the associated reliability optimum. A method was therefore developed to determine the influence of time-independent variables on the development of failure probability over time. This method can also be used to evaluate target reliability indices of other civil and geotechnical structures. The target reliability indices obtained for quay walls depend on failure consequences and marginal costs of safety investments. The results were used to elaborate the reliability framework of ISO 2394, and associated reliability levels are proposed for various consequence classes. The insights acquired were used to evaluate the acceptable probability of failure for different types of quay walls.
Combined effects of climate change and dam construction on riverine ecosystems
River morphology and riparian vegetation continuously adapt to changing discharge conditions, which makes it a challenge to distinguish long-term development driven by natural discharge variation from the impacts of flow alteration due to climate change and due to dams. The aim of this study was to investigate how such flow alterations affect bio-geomorphological processes and habitat suitability of several fluvial plant and animal species. This is done with a numerical model representing dynamic interactions between morphodynamic processes and riparian vegetation coupled to habitat suitability models of fluvial species. We compared a control run with natural flow regime to altered flow for two scenarios with different dam operating regimes, two scenarios with climate change, and for combinations of dams and climate change. Results show that flow stabilization leads to incision, acute reduced seedling recruitment and decline of riparian vegetation. Climate change generates a gradual response, where high flow extremes counteract an otherwise reduced seedling recruitment of pioneer vegetation, while drying reduces riparian vegetation recruitment and causes vegetation shifts towards lower elevations on the floodplain. Modelled habitat availability for facilitated plant and animal species declines most when the synchronicity between critical life history events and habitat requirements is disrupted by altered flow conditions, with opposite effects for different species. Dynamic interactions between bio-geo-morphological processes with somewhat different characteristic timescales create non-linear and adaptive behaviour of morphology, habitat patterns and facilitated species habitat. This implies that only models that include bio-geomorphological feedbacks can forecast impacts of multiple flow alteration pressures, whereas addition of single-pressure regime effects is overly simplistic.